Personal Narrative: My Earthquake In Haiti

Haiti overloads my soul with so much joy, but breaks my heart into a million pieces. Haiti, the supreme monetarily deprived country in the Western Hemisphere that also hosts the most dangerous slums, paradoxically, has the richest society in affection, bliss, and compassion; the people are vibrant, strong, and resilient. The country itself is a realm of contrasts. Since the year of 2010, my world, and Haiti, has never been the equivalent to their previous ways of life. An earthquake with a magnitude of 7.0 on the Richter scale, killing more than two hundred and thirty thousand people, displacing over one million lives, and injuring over three hundred thousand is where this story originates. I gazed upon beautiful pastures occupied by the utmost emaciated cows I had ever seen, assorted with goats that backed into a vast mountain range to my left, while cars and motorcycles zoomed past myself to my right as if I was moving in slow motion. I felt entangled by the chaos, but yet, I felt this internal sense of peace that I had never felt before. My eyes glistened as I took in the beauty enveloped in the disaster that stood in front of me. I drew in a breath and exhaled subsequently, at that moment prepared myself to
As a group we marched out into the streets of Haiti and started our expedition with the lady we would be residing with. Legrand Mellon, a seventy-three year-old woman at the time, who then and there became my traveling companion and role-model whom I never wanted to